


A Scrooge By Any Other Name

by Anonymous



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A Christmas Carol AU, Crack Treated Seriously, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Humour, Hurt/Comfort, Sort Of, The Magnus Archives Season 2
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:00:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28329375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Plagued with paranoia and desperate for answers, Jon discovers a rather peculiar Lietner in his office one Christmas Eve and is subsequently visited by a series of ghosts. Some bring hope, others tragedy. All of them take great pleasure in telling him how bad he is at his job.A Christmas Carol inspired fic set during season 2 of the Magnus Archives.
Relationships: Gerard Keay & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Sasha James & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13
Collections: Anonymous





	A Scrooge By Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

> _“You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"_  
>  "I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it.”  
> ― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Gertrude was dead. There was no doubt in Jon’s mind about that. In fact, it may well have been the _only_ thing he didn’t find reason to doubt these days.

Jon prodded the package with the end of his pen, tilting it to reread the sender address that, unsurprisingly, had _not_ miraculously changed since Martin dropped it off. He didn’t know who had the legal right to open his successor’s mail, but even without a next-of-kin, it almost certainly wasn’t him.

His eyes traced the words _Head Archivist_ on the sender label. Addressed not to the Institute, but to the archives themselves. After breaking into her flat, opening her mail would hardly be the worst felony he’d committed since accepting the promotion. _Martin_ would know, of course, but who would he tell? Assuming he bothered to follow up at all. After their little chat about his qualifications, Jon doubted he’d have the nerve to rat him out to Elias.

The tape tore away in messy strips, haphazardly bound around the mouldering box. At a guess, he’d say it had been left sitting a while. Perhaps even since before Gertrude died.

The crisp sender label, on the other hand, could well have been bought that same morning. Penned in a careful, near calligraphic hand Jon would have sworn he’d seen somewhere before. Taking great care not to damage it, he wrangled open the loose strips of damp cardboard and emptied the loose packaging out onto the table.

The bundle hit his desk with a dull _thud_ , bound in so many layers of brown paper he almost couldn’t make out the shape of it.

Jon moved with more caution now, taking hold of the end of the tape and peeling back the layers to reveal the brown leather beneath.

Experience taught him to be cautious of books, and the nature of the delivery only served to grate at his already frayed nerves, but as he pushed back the last of the wrappings he found his eyebrows climbing.

“Wouldn’t have pinned Gertrude for a Dickens fan,” he muttered before remembering he never bothered to turn on the tape recorder. His fingers twitched, curling around its phantom shape, and at once he longed to switch it on and narrate his findings.

_Later_. Once he’d investigated and taken his notes and summarised it all nice and neat. For now, the supplementals could wait.

He picked it up, noting how well it fit in his hand. The words _A Christmas Carol_ shone gold against the creased brown leather, a clear betrayal of its age though it had been well protected from the damp. It couldn’t be a coincidence that someone had mailed this book to the archives so close to Christmas.

As he raised it up to eye level, several loose sheets of paper slipped from the binding and fluttered down to rest on his desk.

“Bugger it,” he cursed, reaching for them thoughtlessly. Snatches of words caught his eye before he could make the conscious choice to look away, caution warring against natural curiosity.

_“Who are you?”_  
“Ask me who I was _.”  
“Who _were _you, then?_ ” _said Scrooge, raising his voice_. “ _You’re particular, for a shade_.”

Jon scrambled to shove the loose scraps back inside the cover, panic curdling in his stomach as his eyes fell at once on an all too familiar bookplate. Though he didn’t allow himself to read anymore, his mind seamlessly finished the exchange. Plugging the gaps with half-forgotten memories of Christmas readings and English essays.

_“In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley._ ”

Jon found himself more preoccupied with the words _From the Library of Jurgen Leitner_.

He slammed the book closed and shoved it back in the box, piling the wrappings back on top of it as if he could bury the words burning into his brain. Heart pounding hard against his ribs, he poured over the Institute’s unwritten rules on Leitners in his head.

_Don’t touch them with bare skin. Don’t read anything past the bookplate. Don’t trust anyone known to have come into contact with one. Contain it if possible. If unsafe to do so, avoid at all costs._

Well, too late for all that. What _now?_

He looked over his hands, down at his clothes, at the door, but nothing showed any signs of disturbance. No extra limbs, no impossibly large spiders tapping at his office door. Could he have gotten lucky?

Jon glowered at the sodden lump of a box on his desk. When had he _ever_ been lucky?

“Martin!” he shouted, storming across the room and throwing open the office door. “Martin, get in here!”

He heard the scramble before he saw the man, the frantic rush as he dropped the papers he’d been holding and left his desk almost at a run.

“Um, is there a problem?” he asked, wide eyed and already on the brink of panic.

“That box. Did Rosie say anything about the person who delivered it?”

“No? Nazia said it was sitting out front when she arrived this morning.”

“Nazia?”

“Yeah. She’s been covering for Rosie for the past two days?”

Jon blinked. “I hadn’t noticed. Is she…Er, is she ill?”

“Not as far as I know. Pretty sure she just took some holiday leave. You know, Christmas Eve and all.”

“Today’s _Christmas Eve?_ ”

Martin gave Jon a look somewhere between incredulity and resignation. “I guess you hadn’t noticed that either?”

“I’ve…been preoccupied.”

“Right. You want me to go and ask Nazia if she remembers anything else?”

“Suppose there’s not much point now. Just…be careful if you see any more of them lying around.”

“Alright,” Martin said, the last of the panic draining away and leaving only concern in its wake. “Are you sure you’re alright? You look…”

“Fine, Martin. I’ve just got a lot on my plate,” he snapped back, perhaps a little more forceful than need be. Martin only offered him a tired smile.

“Back to work, then. You want anything from the breakroom?”

“I don’t think that will be necessary.”

“Right…Hey Jon?”

“Mmm?”

“Do yourself a favour. I know you don’t really go in for holidays, but _try_ to take it easy tonight? You look like you could do with an early night.”

Jon pressed his lips thin. “Yes, Martin. I think that will be all.”

Martin opened his mouth, a glint of defiance in his eye as if he intended to argue his point before he thought better of it and shook his head.

“Merry Christmas,” he muttered, slinking off towards the breakroom before Jon’s mind could catch up. He realised he should probably have said it back. It never occurred to him to ask why Martin had taken it upon himself to come in on Christmas Eve.

Contrary to his request, Jon didn’t return home to his flat early that night, something he would likely regret for a very, very long time.

xxx

Someone was sitting at his desk.

Bleary-eyed with exhaustion and clutching his fourth attempt at a decent cup of tea (still never as good as Martin’s, however begrudging he was to admit it), he almost missed the darkened silhouette entirely when he stepped inside his office. Only the realisation that he couldn’t remember turning off the light woke him up enough to register that he wasn’t quite as alone as he’d assumed.

The panic struck, white hot and blinding even in the dark. Conspiracies about Gertrude’s killer and hidden spies in his archives spun wildly in his head before he could take so much as a single step back, and beneath it all the constant thrum of burning curiosity.

“Who’s there?” he asked, his voice cracking, and already he wanted to slap himself for his stupidity.

Instead of replying, the shadowed figure rose to their feet in a single, swift motion.

Scalding tea sloshed over the lip of his mug as he scrambled back, free hand fumbling for the light switch. Before he could find it, a different source of light flickered to life and illuminated the room.

The lamp on his desk, though weak compared to the glaring fluorescence of the overhead lights, did a fine job of illuminating the aging woman stooped over it. The sight of her would have come as a relief if her face weren’t so uncomfortably familiar.

“I can’t say you’re who I expected,” she said with a note of disapproval. A voice he’d only ever heard over the crackle of a cassette tape.

He _really_ needed a cigarette.

“I’d suggest you stop gaping and come inside. No doubt you have questions, and I’d rather be done with this as soon as possible.”

Jon didn’t step any closer, but nor did he move to step back. He stared, mouth agape and still clutching the institute mug with one hand. The other, at first outstretched in search of a light switch, now clutched at the doorframe for support.

“You’re…Gertrude Robinson,” he choked.

“I suppose I am.”

“You’re supposed to be dead.”

“I _am_ dead,” she corrected. “Elias saw to that.”

“…I think I need to sit down,” he said faintly, and she sighed as if his shock were a personal inconvenience. Despite his proclamation, Jon made no attempt to take a seat in either chair.

Even with only a passing familiarity with her face, he never doubted the identity of his guest. His _impossible_ guest, dressed in a loose cardigan and striped jumper that would have looked at home in his own grandmother’s closet. Her glasses were fractured where they sat perched on her nose, though she didn’t seem to notice.

“This is a dream,” he decided. “Or some…sleep-deprived hallucination.”

“I have neither the time nor the patience to hold your hand while you work through your denial, Mister Sims. Frankly, I’d rather be done with this whole matter sooner rather than later. I suggest you tell yourself whatever lies you need to in order to keep moving forward and pull yourself together.”

His instinct would have been to snap back with a barbed comment, but in his state of shock he could only stare. The woman who was undoubtedly, _impossibly_ Gertrude Robinson fixed him with a withering glare.

“D-Did you say _Elias?_ ” Jon asked when at last his brain caught up, and the resentment in her eyes eased a fraction.

“Not entirely hopeless, then,” she noted.

“Why would _Elias_ want to kill you?”

“Because I was going to burn down his institute.”

“…Right. You know that doesn’t answer as many questions as you might think.”

“This archive isn’t what it looks like. You’ve managed to survive the job this long, and going by the scars, I’m assuming you’ve figured that much out for yourself. You’re trapped here, Sims. Everyone who signs an employment contract with the Institute is, to some extent..”

Jon paused, digesting the bombardment of information while still struggling to process its source. The bizarreness of the conversation made him all the more convinced this must be some vivid, Leitner-induced hallucination. It seemed a few mere lines of text could be enough to infect someone, after all.

He watched a trickle of blood drip from the hem of her sleeve onto his desk, the droplets splashing across his unread statement , though he couldn’t work up the courage to point it out to her. Even in a nightmare, Gertrude Robinson made it clear she was not someone to be trifled with.

“Do you want…help? If you’re…trapped here. Do you have some…unfinished business?” He paused. “Besides the murder, of course.”

Gertrude’s glare darkened until Jon withered under the weight of her gaze. “As a matter of fact, I was rather enjoying being at rest before you went and muddled with that Leitner.”

“I didn’t _muddle_ with it, I just—”

“Poked your nose in where it didn’t belong? I can see why Elias picked you for the job, now.”

With the shock starting to wear off, Jon’s face settled into a scowl. “Did you come back from the dead just to insult me?”

“In a sense, I suppose. You’ve made quite a few mistakes in your time here. It’s natural, to an extent, but I suspect if you continue down the path you’re on for much longer this will all go…rather badly for you. Maybe for everyone.”

“What’s _that_ supposed to mean?”

“It means things can’t continue the way they are. Not if you want to make it out of this place intact, anyway.”

“And I suppose I should trust your judgement on this matter? Pardon me for questioning advice on how to survive when it comes from my _deceased predecessor_.”

“I didn’t say alive,” Gertrude corrected, and even half-convinced this must be some elaborate dream, Jon’s blood ran cold. “I said _intact_. You agreed to be the Archivist, and that’s a title I suspect you’ll bare until your end, natural or otherwise. But there are worse things than death, Mister Sims. If you haven’t learned that by now, I suspect you will very, very soon.”

Jon licked his lips. “How soon?”

“When the bell tolls One, of course. Good luck, Archivist.”

**Author's Note:**

> Should I have posted this in its entirety _before_ Christmas night rather than dragging this out past the festive season? Absolutely. Did this idea hit me with a sledge hammer on Christmas Eve when I had absolutely no time to write it, making this logical course of writing impossible? You bet!
> 
> Hope you guys enjoyed. Next up: the ghost or Archives' past. It's a pity even the End can fix a bad dye job.


End file.
